Engaging Our Communities for a Sustainable Future

Share:

Imagine
a place where hands-on experience with nature is a standard part of
every child’s education. It’s a place where children learn about soil
health and the pollination cycle by putting their fingers in the dirt
and observing bees and other insects, where they have the chance to eat
food they helped to grow in that same dirt. They are supported in these
activities not just by their families and teachers but a broader network
of neighbors and local business people who come together to help nature
flourish in their community.

This
is a real place, and it’s not a rural farming town or green utopian
village—it’s an elementary school in the middle of Washington, DC. For
the last three years, students at the DC Bilingual School have benefited
from an 8,000-square-foot garden that supports science education,
community engagement and outdoor exploration of all kinds.

Gardens
such as this one are essential, and not just for students. Ensuring a
sustainable future for our planet requires a continuous effort to
conserve the ecosystems that sustain us. And it is in places like this
garden where—forgive the pun—we plant the seeds of future conservation
efforts.

We
all know that people depend on nature—for food, water, clean air and
much more. For those of us who live in urban areas, though, nature can
feel removed from our daily lives and our relationship with nature can
become an abstraction, or be forgotten entirely. With global populations
rapidly moving into cities, we need work now to ensure all communities,
especially in those in urban areas, foster relationships with the
environments that sustain them.

At The Nature Conservancy, we’re helping to forge these relationships through our Youth and Volunteer
programs. By educating, engaging and growing a more diverse group of
conservationists and supporters, we can ensure a future where
communities, including those in cities, will value nature and support
its conservation. In addition, by supporting volunteer efforts, we will
provide our members and supporters with opportunities to benefit nature
in ways that sustain their respective communities, as well their own
health through social engagement and physical activity in the outdoors.

The DC Bilingual school garden is representative of both these facets. Supported by a grant from the Conservancy’s Nature Works Everywhere
program, the garden features edible plants, pollinator habitat, a koi
pond and outdoor playing areas. These elements are key features in the
school’s science curricula, says Lola Bloom, operations manager and
wellness coordinator at DC Bilingual.

In
addition to studying pollination and soil, students learn about what
trees do for the environment and how food is grown and prepared. In
fact, food from the garden is featured in the cafeteria salad bar at
regular intervals. “We grow things like strawberries and blackberries,
and they eat something that’s so familiar to them—but when they grow it
from the garden and eat it, it’s mind-blowing,” Bloom says.

Being
in the garden is also an opportunity to increase awareness of the
natural world more generally. “It can feel like we aren’t in nature
because our area has these busy roads and the Metro station and a
freight train,” Blooms says, “but there are also deer, foxes and
raccoons, and a possum that frequents our garden. It gets us to talk
more about nature and pay attention to hawks and other species they
wouldn’t have noticed if it weren’t for the garden.”

The garden plays a central role in the school’s engagement with
volunteers and other members of the broader community as well. Community
work days in the garden bring teachers, families and members of the
broader community together to help improve and maintain the garden. The
garden also brings volunteers from nearby universities and businesses,
including Lowes, which helps to fund the garden and other Conservancy youth engagement programs.

Some
teachers also use the garden as a more welcoming space to meet with
families, and potluck dinners bring the whole neighborhood together.
With the demographics of the school and the broader neighborhood
currently in flux, “there’s a lot of culture-building that needs to
happen,” Bloom says. “The garden has been a good place for that, as
people from all different backgrounds can connect through food or
building things. Ownership can feel more authentic in a garden than in
other areas.”

That
ownership is good for the school, good for the community, and good for
the planet, too. When community members participate in programs like the
compost cooperative and take home and eat food they helped grow, they
form a stronger awareness of and bond with the natural world—and
hopefully a sense of its importance in their lives.

That’s
important for the students, too, Bloom says. Growing up in the city,
many of the students at DC Bilingual “don’t have the ability to go
outside and dig, to pour water on plants and dirt,” she says. “That’s a
big part of our garden—without that space, a lot of these kids might go
home and stay inside, because they don’t have safe spaces to be outside
or engage in this kind of exploration—and that connects to developing an
empathy for the environment.”

One
of our goals at the Conservancy is to help more people of all ages
develop such empathy and affinity for the natural world. Our scientific
research shows that we can achieve a future where people and nature
thrive, but it will take some effort. With everything that nature gives
to our communities, it’s only fair that we give a little something back.